Patrick Cockburn: The General was far too gentle

Patrick Cockburn quoted in Once Upon A Time:

The fact that there is a civil war in Iraq should no longer be in doubt, with the UN saying that 3,000 Iraqi civilians are being killed every month and the dramatic claim last week by American and Iraqi health researchers that the true figure goes as high as 15,000 a month.

[...]

The present slaughter in Iraq is taking place because the existing ethnic and sectarian hostilities have combined with animosities that have been created by the occupation. For instance, a Sunni ex-army officer supporting the resistance now sees a Shia serving in the Iraqi army or police force not just as the member of a different Islamic sect but as a traitor to his country who is actively collaborating with the hated invader.

The last excuse for the occupation was that at least it prevented civil war, but this it very visibly is not doing. On the contrary it de-legitimises the Iraqi government, army and police force, which are seen by Iraqis as pawns of the occupier. When I've asked people in Baghdad what they think of their government, they often reply: "What government? We never see it. It does nothing for us."

More